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Friday, 23 June 2017

Research shows the seabed has become much warmer

Örjan
Gustafsson (Google translate):

"Our
measurements showed that the seabed has become much warmer. At the
end of the Ice Age was the temperature on the seabed -18 degrees. Now
it is about 0 degrees. We also explored the line between frozen and
thawed permafrost in the seabed and could see that this limit lies at
10-30 meters depth, and the limit drops quickly. The permafrost thaws
by an average of 14 cm a year now and then 4 meters in the last 30
years."

Permafrost
in the seabed in the World, the arctic ocean thaws now with an
average of 14 cm per year. It is much more than what you've
previously known, and the process threatens to amplify global
warming, according to a new study from Stockholm university which is
published today in the scientific journal Nature Communications.

– It
is a huge area that is now thaws, it is as large as four times the
Baltic sea, " says Örjan Gustafsson, professor in
biogeochemistry at the Department of environmental science and
analytical chemistry (ACES), Stockholm university, which is one of
the authors behind the study.

He
has in several research projects and expeditions investigated the
conditions in the Arctic seas in order to, inter alia, note the
changes of not only the carbon stored in the permafrost, as it's
usually called ”the sleeping giants”. If this carbon is released
levels of carbon dioxide and methane in the atmosphere which
increases the warming of the climate.

Örjan
Gustafsson and the research group's latest study is based on
observations that have been made over the years 2011-2015 in
kusthavet off the north-east Siberia.

– We
had a isläger there and was out with vehicles and rigs on the sea
ice in order to drill down to the permafrost in the seabed.

The
cores of sediment could then be compared with surveys carried out in
the same places 30 years ago.

– Our
measurements showed that the seabed has become much warmer. At the
end of the ice age was the temperature on the seabed -18 degrees.
Now, it is approximately 0 degrees. We also investigated the
boundaries between frozen and unfrozen permafrost in the seabed and
were able to see that this limit is set at 10-30 meters deep, and the
limit drops quickly. The permafrost thaws with an average of 14 cm
per year now and that is 4 metres in the last 30 years.

Permafrost
is the constantly frozen soil that consists of decomposed organic
material, and already the format of methane; moreover, when a heating
also of methane in the form of natural gas released when
permafrostlagret weakened.

"Previously,
the natural gas held in place by the permafrost that has formed over
it as a lid, but now when the permafrost thaws and becomes perforated
as create channels and then gas is released," says Örjan
Gustafsson, who argue that the latest study is important in order to
understand the processes occurring in the arctic seabed.

– For
the first time, we have been able to observe how permafrost is
constructed in the seabed, the temperature and how quickly it thaws.
If these processes affect the global warming, it is important to take
the height for it and prepare society for it development, " says
Örjan Gustafsson.